


i just wanna see you bleed (open you and set you free)

by killingcve



Category: The Last of Us (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Cheating, Eventual Smut, F/F, Forbidden Love, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Pain, anyways they’re two soulmates who are absolutely terrible for eachother, at least it kicks in after the first chapter, basically the canon ending but what happens after, but can’t beat biology, fic is kinda dark guys
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-26
Updated: 2020-11-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:00:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27720389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killingcve/pseuds/killingcve
Summary: “Ellie finds herself choking back a sob — her palms, clutching the bruised skin of Abby’s throat, suddenly feel like they’re touching fire. Everything in her system recoils, a flash of internal war, and the sensation is so jarring it sends a painful shock of paralysis up her spine.It’s a brutal, violent transformation, but being on top of Abby just suddenly feels wrong.Abby is half unconscious under the water when Ellie feels her fingers slip.And it feels like she’s killing herself.”— OR: The canon-compliant post ending Soulmate AU no one asked for.
Relationships: Abby/Ellie (The Last of Us), implied Ellie/Dina (The Last of Us)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 123





	i just wanna see you bleed (open you and set you free)

**Author's Note:**

> listen to see you bleed - ramsey while you’re reading this for best results.
> 
> anyways i desperately want to talk about abby/ellie and make headcanons so please feel free to shout at me if you like talking about them descending into mania together

The water is frigid.

It’s the first thought that comes to Ellie’s mind as her hands tighten around Abby’s neck, utilizing every ounce of her strength to force her down, just under the lap of the waves.

That, and how dreadfully red her vision is. It could be the hysteria, it could be the pain surging through her system, coloring everything around them in a magnificent crimson. 

She’s shaking with exertion. The ocean seems to reflect the chaos of the moment, the violent waves are the loudest in her ears, save for the ringing and crashing of her own pulse.

Ellie has killed before.

Hundreds, really, with ease and lack of care. Drawing taut the string of her bow, aiming down the sights of her scope, and plunging her mother’s switchblade into the necks of her enemies were all second nature. Instinct, rather, a way to preserve her own life and guarantee her survival.

She’d murdered in the name of vengeance, too, years prior.

Bloodlust is no stranger to her. Ellie considered herself good at managing it, though, if not for the sake of her family. She managed because Dina needed her to. So she spent years homemaking, claiming Dina as her soulmate, settling into a domestic bliss on their farm.

She proved herself a decent parent, and a decent wife. Wore Dina’s bracelet and love with pride, stood strong beside her during the pregnancy and eventually after to love her son. 

But then Tommy showed up. 

It wasn’t like she didn’t know Abby was out there. On more than one occasion she’d wished for her death, allowed Joel’s murderer to slip into her mind unchecked, even after. Ellie had found herself daydreaming brutality, and sometimes even simpler things — the finer details. What Abby would be doing, were she alive; what would she be eating, thinking. 

It was a nag, mainly, a reoccurring thorn in her side.

But Tommy showed up, a physical manifestation of everything Ellie tried to repress, and he showed up with intel and a location. And it’s like reality crashed down around her.

There wasn’t a single piece of Ellie's life that was hers. And soon after that breakthrough, Ellie found herself a woman starved of an opportunity.

So she took it, against all odds, to reclaim her own life.

There’s screaming in the distance, smoke unfurling in the air, and the scent of fire and blood chokes her lungs. Abby thrashes beneath her, scarring her forearms with the bite of a survival instinct, but it doesn’t make any difference.

Ellie rages, and cries, and holds her down with all her might. 

Filled with a notion of retribution, her muscles straining with the exertion of containing Abby’s fight just under the surface. Flashes of Joel and Jesse run through her brain like a projector, images of a life stolen from her.

She can’t even distinguish what it is that she’s feeling. All of her emotions are violent and blended, so much so that it feels like they’re forcing her to disassociate into the recesses of her own mind. Like the bubbling screams underneath her are white noise, played from miles away.

When Abby’s head goes under, Ellie expects to feel relief.

Or at least some satisfaction, the justified sense of an end. A release of some sort, knowing that shortly she’d be unweaving Abby’s threads from the tapestry of her own story. Like a victory waiting to be claimed, a finality where she is in control. Where she doesn’t feel haunted anymore.

But that’s not what happens.

Something inside her, something locked deep away, tears the desire to watch Abby die right from under her skin. It’s like every nerve ending in her body is held up to the licking of an open flame.

Ellie finds herself choking back a sob — her palms, clutching the bruised skin of Abby’s throat, suddenly feel like they’re touching fire. Everything in her system recoils, a flash of internal war, and the sensation is so jarring it sends a painful shock of paralysis up her spine.

It’s a brutal, violent transformation, but being on top of Abby just suddenly feels wrong.

Abby is half unconscious under the water when Ellie feels her fingers slip.

And it feels like she’s killing herself.

It’s powerful enough to knock the air out of her lungs and back, rendering herself useless as she watches Abby emerge from the sea and gasp in fitful lungfuls of air. 

Ellie sits back on her heels and claws at her own chest. She’s trembling, staring at her own body and hands with her mouth agape.

Something deep and tucked away took over, rivaling Ellie’s will and control enough to throw her off from the other woman. Something not her. Which doesn’t — it doesn’t make any sense, and she’s so stuck on the whiplash from being so close that she spends several moments staring at Abby in shock.

Who, she finds after crawling several feet away, is looking at her with the same wild look in her eyes.

For the first time in what seems like forever, Ellie acknowledges that she feels overloaded. There’s a violent, rolling pang in the back of her skull turning her thoughts and her brain into mush. Everything hurts. 

Her wrists ache and her hands throb and she can’t even feel the lower half of her body; the only thing saving her from blacking out is adrenaline, vibrating the last few inches of life into her fingertips.

Abby isn’t faring any better, and Ellie observes her condition with a grimace. She grasps weakly at her side, and blood gushes between and from her fingers. 

The noise that flies out of Abby’s mouth is nothing short of primal.

With a shaking sob, Ellie glances down at her mangled hand. The sight kicks at her instincts, and she covers it to the best of her ability.

Then her shoulder starts burning. But there’s —

— there’s nothing wrong with it.

“Make it stop,” Abby cries, and Ellie looks up at her hysterically. 

Until she sees Abby clutching her left hand, mirroring her own position. And then the wound on her shoulder, as deep as bone, and it clicks.

Why she couldn’t kill her.

Ellie’s retching in seconds. The contents of her stomach empty into the water around her— it’s not pretty, but none of this is. All of her senses blend into one, and she feels on the verge of passing out.

No.

Her lungs scream like they’re filling up with fluid. She finds herself gagging again, and opens her mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. 

Ellie’s convinced that she’s being possessed. Clutching weakly at the base of her stomach, she meets Abby’s gaze with delirium.

“Fuck you.”

There isn’t a shred of decency left in her own body. It has to be a mistake. 

This has to be Abby’s fault. Of course, this — this isn’t an option. It’s wrong. It’s impossible, and as the seconds bleed on and pain licks up her spine she’s almost wholeheartedly decided she’d rather put a bullet in her skull than live in this moment any longer.

For a moment, Ellie wonders if it would kill Abby too. The thought is jarring.

Rising to her own two feet takes an alarming amount of effort, especially when every now and then she’s feeling an aftercurrent of Abby’s injuries. Bile rises in the back of her throat and she narrowly avoids toppling over when the movement pulls against her uninjured shoulder.

She’s trading pain with Abby like it’s a deck of cards.

Ellie gets to the boat after a few stumbled attempts, once she’s able to stand just enough to bear her own weight. With a glance in her direction, Abby has made it just as far, but she isn’t looking at her. Instead, all of her attention is focused on her unconscious companion.

Abby doesn’t seem to have much strength, but if she’s experiencing the same amount of torture as Ellie, she bears it a hell of a lot better. Rather than blanking dumbly in her direction, she’s focused on making a break for it.

Ellie follows suit, weakly untying her boat and tossing her legs over the side.

Abby meets her gaze once she copies her position, situated in her boat and hand on the steer. It looks like she’s hesitating, and her jaw works like she’s going to speak.

Ellie manages the pain in her arm, rubbing weakly at the soreness there, and stares at Abby with a look of exhaustion. No words are exchanged, and the intensity of her gaze — what is it?

Pain? Bitterness? Fatigue? It’s almost disappointment.

It’s somehow none of those things but all of them at once, and more. Ellie grits her teeth, and simply allows the look in Abby’s eyes to strip her raw. But she doesn’t look away, not even to shield herself from the truth of her expression. 

How could she look away?

The motor in Abby’s boat kicks to life and then the moment is over, and Ellie is left watching the waves as the boat steers off.

She watches until they’re nothing more than a speck on the horizon, and until the mist takes them away. The pain overlapping her system, the pain that isn’t hers, gives a final jolt of existence, before it ebbs away and bleeds into a singular numb.

Ellie gives a final glance to her hand, at the ugly stumps of her missing fingers. She convinces herself it’s the shock, the reason she can’t feel them, and vows to cauterize them the second she reaches dry land. 

Moments away from collapsing in exhaustion and half recessed into the depths of her own mind, Ellie turns on the engine. 

The only thing running through her head is a mantra, begging and wild.

Please, it says.

Please don’t be Abby.

**Author's Note:**

> ch. 2 will be posted soon. follow me on tumblr @elliedina and join my abby server.


End file.
